Doctor Discipline Rate Drops, Complaints Rise

As complaints rise against doctors in New York, the number of sanctions
levied against them has dropped. The Office of Professional Medical Conduct
says it sanctioned 292 doctors in 2009, a 25 percent drop from the number
sanctioned just four years earlier. Yet the number of complaints rose
to 9,000 the same year, an 18 percent increase from 2005.

This surprising trend in sanctions - a 15-year low - comes a year after
the New York government initiated stricter oversight of problem physicians
among the 64,000 doctors who practice in the state. Those new measures
included reviewing malpractice payments and publicly identifying physicians
formally charged with misconduct.

According to a recent study by several consumer groups, the actual value
of payments made on malpractice claims has remained stable, when adjusted
for inflation, with $736 million paid for 1,806 claims in 2009. But while
the payouts have remained the same, the cost of malpractice insurance
has increased.

Less than eight percent of doctors are responsible for more than half the
payoffs made for malpractice claims. Doctors in New York who have paid
more than three malpractice claims account for a larger percentage of
malpractice payments.

The same study found that 60 percent of the disciplinary actions taken
by the OPMC were initiated by sanctions approved in other states or in
local and federal courts; few investigations were initiated by the OPMC
itself. And with the number of physicians in New York rising each year
(the state now has the third highest per capita number of doctors in the
nation), critics say sanctions and disciplinary action should rise, not drop.

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